Consumers are desirous of consuming novel confections, gourmet quality foods, and beverages which require a minimal amount of time and preparation thereof. Examples of desirous beverages include freshly prepared and/or squeezed fruit beverages, such as orange juice, pineapple juice and lemonade. Other desirous beverages include soft drinks having foam on top, such as root beers, cola and fruit-flavored soda beverages. Attributes of freshly prepared fruit beverages include the presence of foam, which is produced on a top surface of a freshly squeezed or freshly prepared fruit drink from the respective fruit during the preparation, such as the squeezing, blending or extraction processes. The amount of foam in freshly prepared drinks typically can be in the range of 10 to 400 ml/liter, 1 minute after the preparation. Soft drinks can have foam up to 100% of the liquid volume and the foam can last up to 48 hours.
For convenience and ease of preparation, prior instant, also known as powder compositions or powder beverages have been developed. In order to prepare a beverage from prior powders, a consumer mixes the powder beverage with water to produce the liquid beverage.
One disadvantage of conventional liquid beverages produced from prior powders is that the resulting liquid beverage does not have many of the characteristics which consumers associate with freshly prepared, e.g., squeezed or blended, fruit beverages, or other soft drink beverages, such as foam on top. For example, typically liquid beverages produced from prior soluble fruit-flavored and non-fruit flavored compositions will not have foam on the top surface of the liquid without some type of physical agitation, stirring or mixing in a blender sufficient to incorporate air into the liquid. Further, the resulting prior liquid beverage will not have the same consistency in terms of aerated liquid which consumers associate with a beverage which has been produced by a squeezing, blending or extraction process, or a soft drink that has a foam on top. In addition, prior soluble beverages do not have the same texture as freshly squeezed fruit drinks, which often contain pulp or pieces of fruit.
In the beverage art, there are dry mix fruit-flavored beverages which produce a highly viscous, slushy-type fruit-flavored beverage when mixed with water, optionally ice, and possibly prepared in a blender. One such prior beverage is disclosed in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2002/0001656.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,730,336 discloses various flavored beverage products, including a fruit-flavored beverage product which produces a creamy beverage using a fat substitute, whey protein, known as SIMPLESSE®.
There exists a need in the instant beverage art for a new and improved composition which when placed in water mimics a freshly squeezed fruit juice beverage.